Date Night in Manchester When You’ve Done All the Restaurants

Manchester’s restaurant scene is genuinely good, which is part of the problem. Once you’ve worked through the ones you both like, date night settles into a short rotation. Italian in Ancoats, something new in the Northern Quarter, or the place one of you went to for a work do.

The food is rarely the issue. It’s that a table for two puts the whole weight of the evening on conversation, and some nights you’ve already covered everything in the car on the way there.

THE CUBE Manchester is what a date night looks like when the activity carries the evening instead.

You’re in it together, not sat across from it

You take on the glass box as a pair, with a countdown clock running and challenges that look far easier from outside than they turn out to be. What happens next is hard to predict, because pressure surfaces things three courses never will. Who stays calm. Who laughs at the wrong moment. Who takes a glass box far more seriously than they’d admit.

There’s a leaderboard at the end, which gives you a result to dispute on the way home. That’s more than most dinners leave you with.

Worth knowing before you book

Games are played in groups of four, split into teams of two. Booking as a pair means you’ll be matched with another pair on the day and your scores go onto a shared leaderboard.

Some people prefer that, since it adds a rivalry beyond the two of you. If you’d rather keep it to yourselves, book as a four with another couple you know.

A session runs around 90 minutes to two hours. Food and a fully stocked bar are in the same building, so you can make an evening of it without booking somewhere else.

Where it fits in the rotation

It works as a low-key first date, because there’s something to do and an obvious talking point afterwards. It works just as well when you’ve been together years and the restaurant list has run dry.

It’s not a replacement for a good dinner. It’s the thing to do when the usual plan has started to feel automatic.

THE CUBE is inside Urban Playground at the Manchester Arndale, with Putters crazy golf in the same venue. Book ahead at weekends and check opening hours for the day you’re planning.